A Galra and Lance Sitting in A Tree
by bluejwrtr
Summary: One-shot. Takes place during early season 3. Lance is just doing his job as team sharpshooter when a Galra soldier decides to go and push him out of a tree. Rated T for a somewhat graphic injury.


**A.N. Hey guys! I'm back! If any of you are waiting on updates for _To Lance or Bust_ , I am still planning on finishing it (eventually). This story was just a bit of fun while I was bored. It was originally supposed to be more angsty than this, but I was having too much fun just playing with the characters, so it's actually relatively fluffy. Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own either _Voltron: Legendary Defender_ or _Singin' in the Rain_. **

Lance crouched on a branch of a thick oak tree, eyes trained on the battle below. Reports of a downed Galra ship with soldiers attacking locals had drawn them here. The forest on this planet was too thick, so they'd been forced to search on foot instead of in the lions. Now they were finally confronting the enemy. Keith had sent Lance up into this tree first as a lookout, and then as a sniper.

Lance saw motion out of the corner of his eye. "Guys! Looks like the reinforcements have arrived." Several Galra were approaching the battlefield, and most of them were actual soldiers rather than robots. He let out a deep breath. This just got a whole lot harder. "Do you want me to come down, Keith?"

"No, you'll be more use watching our backs up there!" Keith yelled back. Lance was a little bit hurt. Sure, he was the team sharpshooter. But he wasn't that bad at close range fighting. He itched to be down there with the rest of his team, but he had to support Keith by following his orders.

He noticed that a few Galra were trying to gang up on Pidge. Lance readied his rifle, but Pidge lashed out with her bayard and took them all down with one electric blast. He smirked and turned his attention to the others. They all seemed to be holding their own.

Then a burst of fire came from a tree across from his, hitting Hunk in the leg. Lance heard him cry out over the comms and immediately raised his sights to find the enemy sniper. There was only one sharpshooter allowed in this battle. He spotted a shock of purple fur and made the shot. A blur of purple followed by a thump confirmed that he'd hit his target, and Lance whooped in celebration.

"Hunk, buddy, you okay?" The yellow paladin was back up again already, letting the Galra have it with his blaster. But it didn't hurt to make sure.

"Yeah, the shot just grazed me. Knocked me off balance, but didn't get through my armor," Hunk grunted. Lance glanced over the battle again and focused on Keith, who had a large Galra sneaking up behind him while he fought with two smaller ones attacking him from the sides.

Lance let off a shot and huffed in annoyance when it hit the Galra's arm. Keith looked up at the noise, and his moment of distraction allowed one of the other Galra to get a good swipe in. Lance watched in dismay as Keith's helmet flew off and the three Galra moved in for the kill. He was about to take them out when a sudden shove from behind sent him tumbling towards the ground.

Lance screamed and caught a glimpse of a smiling bluish Galra occupying his branch before he hit the ground. Something cracked and he fell in a heap, feeling shocks of pain all over his body.

The others were all yelling and talking at once over the comms. "Keith!" he heard Allura yell. Lance went cold. He hadn't been there to take out Keith's attackers. Someone else said his own name, but he was more worried about whether Keith was still alive.

"What happened? Is Keith okay?" Lance yelled. He tried to move, to get up and see what was going on. But his leg exploded with pain and he fell back down instead. He heard footsteps behind him and looked over. The blue Galra was smirking at him. He had a nasty looking sword in one hand, and he didn't look afraid to use it. Thankfully, Lance still had his bayard in his hand. He raised it at his attacker and fired without hesitation. This was no time to be nice. He'd feel bad about it later, but right now he had other things to worry about.

The others were still talking over each other. "Shut up, will you?" he yelled. The others went silent. "I can't see what's going on. Tell me what's happening!"

Pidge was the one to answer. "Keith got knocked out. We were able to get the Galra off of him, but he's still unconscious."

"Are you all right, Lance?" asked Allura. "We heard you yell."

Lance looked down at his leg. It was hard to tell with his armor on, but it sure felt broken. "Some guy decided to knock me out of the tree. But I'll be okay. How's the battle going?"

"There's only a few more left," replied Hunk. "And now it looks like they're getting an order to retreat."

Lance sighed in relief. That was good, at least. He carefully stood up, using a nearby tree to take the weight off his bad leg. Now he was above the underbrush, he could see his teammates gathered around Keith.

"Hunk, could you give me hand?"

Hunk turned towards him and walked over. He still had his blaster resting against his shoulder. He deactivated his bayard and looked Lance up and down. "What's wrong? I thought you said you were okay."

"I said I will be okay," Lance said, trying not to sound too grumpy. He'd never been that great at dealing with pain, and just standing up like this was making him want to pass out. "I think my leg's broken."

Hunk frowned. "Should you even be standing up?"

"Just help me get over to the others, okay?" Lance held out an arm. "Let me lean on you and I'll be fine."

Hunk came closer and let Lance sling his arm over his shoulder. "I could just carry you," he offered.

"No, thanks," Lance said, gritting his teeth as they started to move. He felt something dripping down his leg and into his right boot. Rats. He must be bleeding.

They reached the others and Hunk helped Lance sit down on a fallen log. Allura was examining a bloody wound on Keith's head. "How bad is it?" Lance asked. He already felt a deep pit of guilt swirling in his stomach.

Keith groaned and opened his eyes. "I'll live," he said grumpily.

"Don't try to move yet," Allura warned. "Let me bandage you up first." She pulled out a small first aid kit from a compartment in her armor and began rummaging through it. Pidge knelt next to her and peered into Keith's eyes.

"You probably have a concussion," the green paladin said.

"Tell me something I don't know," Keith said. He looked over at Lance and frowned. "What happened to you?"

"Doesn't matter," Lance said quickly. "I'm really sorry I let those guys get you, Keith. I should have had your back."

Keith winced as Allura tied a bandage around his head. "It's just a scratch, I'll be fine."

"You two both have a messed up idea of 'fine,'" Hunk grumbled. "Keith, you have a concussion and Lance has a broken leg. Neither of you is fine, especially since we have to find a way to get both of you out of this forest and back to the lions."

"I can carry one of them," Allura offered.

"I can walk," said Keith. He sat up and looked over at Lance. "I'm guessing you can't."

Lance twitched his foot experimentally and had to bite his lip to keep from screaming out at the pain. "Nope, not so much."

"We can splint it so it doesn't hurt as bad," offered Hunk. He helped Lance remove his boot and leg braces. Just that made him want to throw up. The pain seemed to be getting worse as the shock wore off.

"Oh, that's gross," Hunk said when they pulled off the leg brace. Lance looked down and saw that his foot was set at a crooked angle while halfway down his shin a sharp bit of white bone was sticking out. He had to close his eyes and breathe deeply for a moment. Then he heard Hunk quickly move away and puke into the bushes. That made his own stomach muscles clench in sympathy, and Lance quickly leaned over to be sick himself. When he was done, he had to brace himself against the log he was sitting on to keep from falling over.

"Thanks, Hunk," he said sarcastically. "Just what I needed."

"Hey, there's a reason I failed First Aid at the Garrison," Hunk said as he emerged from the bushes, wiping his mouth. He kept his eyes averted from Lance's leg. "Maybe somebody else should splint it for you?"

Lance looked around at the others. Keith was concussed, Pidge looked about to throw up herself, and Allura had gone pale like she was about to pass out. Where was a handy doctor when you needed one?

"I can do it," Allura said, stepping forward. "I think."

Lance eyed her. "Let me guess, Alteans don't get broken bones."

"Not often," she admitted. "Our bones have to be strong enough to support larger body mass should we choose to transform. I didn't realize human bones were so . . . fragile."

"I'm not fragile," Lance said sulkily. "I was pushed out of a gigantic tree. I probably fell like twenty feet."

"Your armor should have protected you," Allura pointed out.

Lance felt his face flushing. "Just splint the stupid thing, will you? Don't we need to get out of here?"

"Yeah," Keith said. "We really should get moving before the Galra can gather more forces and attack again." He sat up slowly and rested against the nearest tree. Lance frowned. He was still much paler than normal, and his bandage was already showing spots of red.

Lance jumped a little bit when Allura put a hand on his leg. "So, what do I need to do?" the princess asked.

Hunk handed her a small branch. "Tie that to Lance's leg to keep it from moving around too much."

Pidge pulled out her own first aid kit. "Here's some more bandages. You should probably put some on to help with the bleeding before you splint it. And Lance, you should find something to bite down on. This is going to hurt."

Hunk handed him another stick. Lance looked at it warily. "You're sure this isn't poisonous or anything?"

"No," Hunk said with a shrug. "But that's all we have right now." Lance rolled his eyes and bit down in the branch.

Allura hesitated, and he nudged her with his good foot. She took a deep breath and carefully put the bandage to Lance's leg. His eyes started watering at the contact. When she lifted up his leg to begin wrapping the bandage around it and the branch, his vision blacked out, leaving only the pain.

Lance came to leaning against Hunk, covered in cold sweat. His leg did feel a little better though. He spat out the branch and looked up at Allura. "Thanks, Princess." He didn't like how high and scratchy his voice had gotten all the sudden.

Allura nodded at him. "We need to go. Keith, are you ready?" Keith nodded, and before he knew it, Lance was hoisted up over Allura's shoulder and they began moving through the forest in the direction of their lions.

"This is embarrassing," Lance muttered.

"At least I'm not carrying you," Pidge said brightly. "Could be worse."

Lance groaned. "Let's just forget this ever happened, okay?" His head was already starting to pound from all the blood rushing to it. Thankfully Allura was keeping his leg immobile, or he might have already passed out again.

* * *

Hunk didn't like seeing either of his friends in pain. Keith had a permanent scowl on his face and he kept nearly stumbling. Hunk tried to keep as close to him as he could without hurting Keith's pride. Every so often, he'd look over at Lance, who was staying quiet. That couldn't be a good sign. He seemed to be conscious still, just dazed.

It was quickly getting darker as they moved. Hunk looked up to see a cloudy sky above, and noticed that wind was whipping around the tops of the trees. "I think it's going to rain," he said.

"Awesome," grunted Keith. "At least the stupid sun's not as bright now."

"Should we try and find shelter?" asked Pidge. "We don't know how bad storms get on this planet."

"No, we need to get back to the lions," said Keith, glancing over at Lance. Hunk looked over to see that droplets of blood were now dripping from Lance's leg onto the princess's armor.

"Yeah," he agreed. "We need to get Lance back to the castle for a cryo-nap."

* * *

Sure enough, the rain started about ten minutes later. The trees sheltered them from the worst of it, but it wasn't long before they were all soaked. The upside was that the water seemed to have woken Lance up some, as he had quickly decided to sing them a rather pathetic version of "Singin' in the Rain."

"Is he delirious or something?" Keith asked as he pushed his sopping bangs out of his face.

"Probably not," said Hunk. Pidge just snorted.

"I'm laughin' at clouds, so dark up above . . . the sun's in my heart and I'm ready for love!" Lance sang, winking flirtatiously at Pidge. He had to pause a moment to catch his breath before starting the next line. "Come on, guys, join in! It'll make this go a lot faster."

"Or just draw the Galra to us that much faster," said Keith, crossing his arms with a shiver.

Lance stuck out his tongue at him and started the next verse. Hunk smiled and joined in. Allura looked puzzled.

"I don't understand why anyone would be so happy about rain," she said to Keith, who shrugged.

"Don't ask me."

* * *

They decided to stop and wait out the storm once the wind picked up and lightning started flashing ominously above them.

"Aren't you supposed to stay away from trees during a lightning storm?" asked Hunk, peering up at the branches of the huge pine tree above them.

"Not much point in that," said Pidge. She ran a hand through her sopping mess of hair. "If one of these trees gets hit, we're pretty much dead anyway."

"Thanks, Miss Optimism," said Lance. He was just glad not to be slung over Allura's shoulder anymore. It had gotten really uncomfortable after a while. Now his stomach muscles were sore in addition to his throbbing leg.

"We should change your bandages," said Allura, looking at both Keith and Lance.

Keith gingerly touched his and winced. "Do you have anything dry enough?"

"I've still got my first aid kit," said Hunk, pulling it out. "How about yours and Lance's?"

Lance shifted a little and made a face. "I think I forgot to restock mine after our run in with that bear thing."

Keith reached for his first aid kit and looked through it. He pulled out a scrap of bandage as big as his hand. "This is all I have left."

Pidge snorted. "I'm beginning to think the two of you are just more accident prone than the rest of us."

"No, I'm accident prone," Lance said, pointing to himself, then at Keith. " _He's_ just a hothead."

Keith rolled his eyes. "Whatever. You're just as bad as I am."

Lance was silent for a minute. "That's almost a compliment, coming from you." He grunted and recoiled in pain as Hunk started unwrapping the bandages around his leg. "Hey, careful! And please don't puke again."

"I won't," said Hunk, although he was grimacing at all the blood on Lance's leg. "We need to stop this bleeding."

"Just don't press too hard," Lance said, resting his head against the tree trunk and closing his eyes. Hunk put the fresh bandage on the wound and pressed down. Lance cried out and curled his hands into fists. Pidge came over and grabbed one of his hands.

"Not too much longer," she said encouragingly.

"How's Keith looking?" Hunk asked, trying to keep his mind off what he was doing.

"Better," said Allura. "The bleeding's stopped."

"I'm a fast healer," said Keith. "Worry about Lance, not me."

Hunk nodded and stopped putting pressure on Lance's leg for a moment. He checked to see if the wound was still bleeding. "This isn't working," he said.

"Just keep trying," Allura urged. "We don't know how long it'll take to get Lance in a pod. He might bleed out if we're not careful."

Hunk sighed and pushed on Lance's leg again. He looked up at his face and saw that he was biting his lip to keep from crying out and sweat was beginning to drip down his forehead. "Sorry, buddy," he said. Lance nodded but didn't say anything.

Everyone stiffened when they heard voices nearby. They had the deep growliness of the Galra.

"Hunk, you stay here with Lance," Keith whispered. "We'll take care of this."

"You should stay here too, Keith," Allura whispered back. "You're still injured. Pidge and I can draw them away and circle back to you."

Keith nodded with an unhappy look on his face. Hunk realized that he must really be in pain still not to protest at all. The two women left the shelter of the tree, leaving the three boys staring at each other in silence. Hunk checked Lance's wound again. This time, the bleeding seemed to have slowed down some. He replaced the bandage and tied it tightly, then replaced the splint. When he was finished, Lance was still conscious but pale and breathing hard. Hunk settled down next to him and pulled out his bayard. He trusted Allura and Pidge, but it didn't hurt to be prepared.

Keith came over and sat next to them, sword in hand. He kept fidgeting until Hunk gave him a sharp look, which he returned with a glare but stopped moving around. The distant voices were replaced with shouting, then the noise moved away until it disappeared altogether. All three of the boys sighed in relief.

"I knew we could count on them," Lance said softly.

"They'd better make it back safe," Keith said, moving into a crouch. "We really don't need any more injuries today."

Hunk nodded. "If Allura got hurt, we'd really be sunk." Lance put a hand on his shoulder.

"Stop worrying so much. Allura's pretty much invincible, remember. Actually, I feel a little sorry for those Galra that have to deal with her."

"Not to mention Pidge," Keith added with a smile. "She's pretty deadly when she wants to be."

"Figures we'd get stuck with two of the toughest women in the universe," Lance said, grinning. "They're pretty great, huh?"

* * *

Lance was getting tired of waiting. He really just wanted to go fly back to the castle and jump in a healing pod. His leg was killing him, hopefully not literally. He carefully shifted himself a little higher against the tree. Hunk looked over at him.

"Just a little bit longer, buddy."

Lance nodded. "I know." He looked over at Keith. "Is he asleep?"

Hunk looked over and his eyes widened. "You're not supposed to sleep when you have a concussion, right?" He went to nudge Keith, but Lance grabbed his arm.

"No, you're just supposed to be woken up every so often. Let him get some rest. I'm sure he needs it."

Keith murmured something that sounded vaguely like "snuffaluffagus". Lance raised an eyebrow. "I didn't know Keith talked in his sleep." He gave a wicked grin. "Think we could get him to say something embarrassing?"

Hunk sighed. "What was that you just said about letting him get some sleep? Seriously, Lance, it's like you switch between being a responsible adult to a six-year-old in seconds."

"I don't want to be too predictable." Lance shifted again and this time he winced as he accidentally jarred his broken leg. "Be honest. If I acted responsible all the time, you'd get worried. Not to mention bored."

"Guess so." Hunk yawned. "Watching Keith sleep is making me tired."

Lance squinted out at the little bit of sunlight he could see through the branches. "I think it stopped raining. That's a good thing, right?'

Hunk answered with a snore. Lance groaned. "Really? You're going to leave me alone here?" He gently took Hunk's blaster out of his hands and let it transform back into a bayard. Then he pulled out his own and transformed it into his rifle.

* * *

About an hour later, Lance snapped to attention when he heard footsteps approaching their tree. When a hand reached to move aside a branch, he growled out, "You'd better not be a Galra."

"Lance?" said Allura in surprise. "Why are you on lookout?"

Lance lowered his gun and smiled. "The others fell asleep." Allura and Pidge poked their heads in and smiled at the sight of Hunk and Keith leaning against each other, fast asleep.

"I wish I had my tablet so I could take a picture," said Pidge.

"What took you guys so long?"

"The Galra were a little harder to shake off than we anticipated. But we got away undetected eventually," said Allura. "Let's get back to the lions. The sun's going to start setting soon."

Pidge threw a pinecone at Hunk, who woke up with a surprised shout. Keith startled too at the noise, and they both blinked dazedly up at the others.

"Rise and shine," said Pidge with a grin.

Keith rubbed his eyes. "Sorry, I didn't realize I was so tired."

"That's alright. It was probably the concussion," said Allura, holding out a hand to help him up. "But we need to get moving."

"I guess that means I have to go back to my sack of potatoes act," said Lance. Hunk carefully helped him out from underneath the tree.

"I can probably carry him now," the yellow paladin said to Allura. "Since you've been running around while I took a nap."

Allura nodded, and she helped get Lance over Hunk's shoulder. "How's that feel, Lance?" Hunk asked, patting his uninjured leg.

"Great," he grunted. "At least your shoulder's wider than Allura's."

"Are you calling me bony?" Allura asked with a grin.

"No, princess, you're just a little more . . . petite than Hunk."

She raised an eyebrow. "I'll keep that in mind next time I have to carry you. I'll be sure to make myself a little bulkier."

"Should I be offended by that?" asked Hunk as they started walking again.

* * *

They made it back to the castle without any other problems. Red had even been perfectly okay to let Black tow her along while Lance stayed with Hunk in the yellow lion. Allura had been a little hesitant to let Keith fly with his concussion, but Keith pointed out that Black was the only one big enough to tow another lion. Lance had helpfully added that Keith was good enough to fly Black with his eyes closed, causing everyone to wonder if he had a concussion too.

Lance sat in the infirmary, staring at the open pod that they were getting ready for him. "I guess I'm making a habit of this."

Hunk patted him on the shoulder. "Just be more careful next time, will you? I'm glad you watch our backs, but don't forget to watch yours too."

Lance smiled up at him. "I don't think that's physically possible."

"You know what I mean." He stood back and held out a hand to help Lance up. Just before Allura closed the pod, Lance held out a hand to stop her.

"Don't go doing anything crazy while I'm asleep, okay? I'd better not wake up to find out that you stopped another Galra invasion of the castle or Keith got eaten by a weblum."

"Hey!" said Keith, who was getting ready for his own nap in a pod. Lance grinned at him and laid back, allowing Allura to press the button that activated the cryo-process.

"He just had to have the last word, didn't he?" grumbled Keith.

"That's Lance for you," Hunk said.


End file.
